2009 NHL Playoff Thread

Don't see how. They're perennial underachievers, have been for quite a few years. Ducks are inconsistent and undisciplined, but have a large core of their Cup-winning team still on the roster. All the major playmakers anyway, including their invaluable captain. S. Neidermayer controls the game better than any defenseman in the league.

That's just idiotic. :

 

Seriously, Buck. When you put in six months of hard work and finish 30-something points ahead of another team and all you get as a reward is (potentially) one extra home game? And, in this series, it didn't even come to that.

So for all the good things you did over six months and 82 games and all you have to show for it is a lousy PT banner? I think it's going to damn hard to sell season-ticket packages for the Sharks next season. Why? Because the league has just told us that the regular season doesn't mean squat. So, fine, next year, we'll shit the bed for 5 months, have one good month, ease in as the No. 8 seed and go from there.

I just think the regular season should matter, like it does in US college football.

 

Bullshit. The league hasn't told nobody nothin'. The Sharks are a bunch of underachievers. It's their own fucking fault. Blame them for only earning a "lousy PT banner".

Play better.

 

Well, what should happen, Mark? Division winners already get the three top seeds in the conference regardless of how many points they earn - should they get first-round byes too? Tell us.

 

Don't want to pile on, Mark. But that happens when you make absurd statements here. You say you're not a fanboi, then you whine like a fanboi.

 

The Patriots once won 18 straight games to start the season and lost in Super Bowl XLII.
The Mariners once won 116 regular season games and lost the ALCS in five games to the Yankees.
And in hockey, we all know about the President's Cup curse -- real or imagined -- in which seven teams in the past 20-some years of the award have won the Stanley Cup.

Bottom line, the Ducks are better than their seed suggests and they matched up well with the Sharks. Even the Red Wings haven't been immune to 1-8 series upsets. It happens.

 

Yep, the same thing happened to the Red Wings only three seasons ago.

Guess what they did? They knuckled down, went to the conference final a year later and won the Cup a year after that.

 

Don't forget the 1954 Cleveland Indians, who went 111-43 and got swept in the World Series.

 

Honestly, I dunno, mate. I just thought it was a tough draw, that Anaheim was better than an 8 seed, certainly better than Columbus or St. Louis. (Of course, it was a pretty damn tough draw for the Ducks, too. So it runs both ways.) I don't know if byes would help. Back when the NBA had first-round byes --- gosh, I'm actually old enough to remember those days --- people complained about a rested or rusty team playing one with momentum. Ditto now in the NFL and CFL.

And one would think a best-of-seven would be less upset prone than a best-of-five. I'm not sure there's anything anyone can do; just saying it takes some luster off the playoffs, that's all. Like when the NY Giants lost early in the NFL playoffs.

But what does it say about the 82-game season? You can fart around all you want in November and December, but one slip-up in April can be fatal. That's the system, I accept that. It just leads me to lose interest in all these other meaningless games.

So, I guess the one thing I'd do is cut the regular season to, say, 60 games. The last two months of going back and forth settle nothing. If the season was a week longer, or a week shorter, maybe the Oilers or Wild are in and the Ducks are out. It's like musical chairs and just who happens to be where when the music stops.

It does bother me that you play six months and playoff spots come down to whether someone gets a regulation loss or shootout loss on the last day. There should be more separation than that after six months.

And, yes, I would like to see the point system overhauled.

 

As for the Flames.....

Where do they go from here, after a fourth straight first-round exit? Does Keenan come back? What about Kiprusoff? And I couldn't help but wonder about Todd Bertuzzi, who scored their only goal but also took a bad penalty that led to Chicago's first goal.

I've liked Bert all the way back to his Canuck days, former all-star, former Olympian. But is this the end of the road after five teams in four seasons?

Is Phaneuf on the trading block? I gotta figure they will probably shake up the nucleus and no one except Iginla and maybe Cammalleri is untouchable.

 

I love the idea of a shorter season; whether 60 games is the right number, I don't know. But when I become World Sports Czar, this is my first mandate: NHL and NBA playoffs have to be concluded by Mother's Day, the World Series before Columbus Day.

Didn't I see a scroll the other day that said the NFL would consider playing the Super Bowl on Presidents Day weekend if it goes ahead and adds to the regular season? Idiots.

 

The days of St. Mike's as a hockey powerhouse are long gone--like about 1967 after the NHL instituted the draft. I don't even think they've won a Toronto high school hockey championship in recent memory. Terrific football teams though